


heaven ain't close in a place like this.

by greatzodiac



Category: Band of Brothers, The Pacific (TV)
Genre: Clubbing, Drinking, F/F, Fluff, One Shot, attempts at flirting, background Vera Keller/Lena Riggi Basilone, this title absolutely came from a song and I'm not sorry for it.
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-05
Updated: 2017-09-05
Packaged: 2018-12-24 03:37:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,431
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12004176
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/greatzodiac/pseuds/greatzodiac
Summary: A club. Dancing. Sweating hands, sweating bodies, and sweating drinks. A girl at the bar. One hot summer night where inside offers no refuge. Wanting to take her home tonight.





	heaven ain't close in a place like this.

**Author's Note:**

> Yes, this was inspired by "Somebody Told Me" by The Killers. It's a bop; don't @ me.

It had been a long day at the restaurant for Stella. It was the summer months and that meant tourist season; by extension, that meant lots of hungry and curious customers who wanted to try something new. The air-conditioned restaurant offered a reprieve from the sweltering heat and exhaustion setting in from walking around for so long. As a waitress, she had to be on her feet all day, and today seemed to last ten times longer because of all the people. Stella’s feet were killing her, but she’d be damned if she didn’t get the most tips today, and she’d be damned if she broke a promise to a friend, which was that she’d go out tonight.

Stella Karamanlis was not one to cancel plans, especially when she made a promise, even if she wanted to soak her feet for a few hours and drink some red wine. Her friends insisted they take her out because they hadn’t seen her in so long, and that was true; it’d been a few weeks since they all went out last. This was more circumstantial than anything, as things kept coming up for each of them: covering a shift at the restaurant; another college to go to and lecture at; more cakes to bake. They’d all get ready at Stella’s house, and having Vera show up and forget that she still had a pencil behind her ear, and Lena showing up with flour on her rear were no strangers to Stella or to her house.

It was also no stranger to Vera and Lena that, from time to time, Stella would have downed half a bottle of wine by herself by the time they got over there. (They’d call it pre-club drinks and they would also drink a ton of wine. Then they would call an Uber because they’re “safe and responsible adults.”)

But tonight, Stella was determined to go out and have a good time with her friends. If they couldn’t find anyone there that they liked, they’d go back to Stella’s and have a pajama party. They’d all get good and drunk and watch bad movies for fun. _The Room_ is popular amongst them; so much so that one specific day every year, they have a viewing party and each year is crazier than the last.

For some reason, Stella felt that tonight would be her night, and she had to dress accordingly. As she scanned her closet for something suitable, her gaze landed on a once-worn floral dress. With the amount of dresses she owns that have floral print on them, she was surprised that she forgot about this one. It was a gorgeous dress, too: navy with pink flowers all over; short sleeves; a round neckline (which she was grateful for); and it came up to mid-thigh and covered enough, but still had enough skin showing to get some attention.

And that was exactly what she was looking for.

She decided to forego the heels tonight and went with some strappy black sandals, which would be kinder to her feet. For the first time in a long while (outside of work), Stella put her hair up in a ponytail and let some strands fall on either side of her face to frame it. She applied light makeup and when she looked at her full outfit in the mirror, she thought, “I look fucking _hot._ ”

When Vera and Lena showed up, they said the same. Vera wore her usual mid-thigh dress, like Stella’s was, and Lena wore her shorts and a tank top.

“Typical summer outfits for some hot summer babes like us!” Lena said, starting on her second glass of wine. Stella took it from her and set it down on the counter.

“We can’t drink too much here,” she said. “August 2015. Ring a bell?”

Vera and Lena cringed at the memory.

“Glad we’re in agreement,” Stella said, ushering them outside to where their cab was waiting.

In a way, Stella knew that going to clubs nowadays for all three of them to find people to hook up with was more an attempt to get Stella laid, rather than her _and_ Vera and Lena. Try as they might, they couldn’t keep their relationship from her, or a secret, for too long. Lingering touches, meaningful glances. It was obvious to her just as it was obvious for any gay person to spot another gay person.

Stella was sat behind the driver, with Vera in between her and Lena. She snuck glances over at them and watched them interact, let their hands linger for a moment too long on legs, arms, shoulders. She smiled. She knew, but she’d let them have their fun for now. Let them “excuse” themselves again, five minutes apart, because someone wasn’t feeling well and the other girl wanted to check on the one that left. Stella wouldn’t see either for another twenty minutes, but she wouldn’t mind.

Normally she wouldn’t, but Stella hadn’t brought anyone back to her place or been taken to anyone else’s for what felt like months now. Work was killer, and almost every weekend she was going over to visit her parents, who lived fifteen minutes away and would show up on her doorstep at any time. Stella inherited this house from a relative that passed away, and it was cozy and quaint. So, naturally, this place being in the family, her family wanted to make sure the upkeep on it was doing all right, with Stella working a lot and all.

This made for some tricky moments when you have to get your one-night stand out the back and around the house with large, open windows on every wall, and make sure your parents don’t see them.

“Stella, when are you going to settle down?” her mother would ask.

 _When we hire more servers and I stop working 55 or 60 hours a week_ , Stella would think, _then just maybe I’ll consider it._

The place they went to was their usual spot, with the name of the club in bright neon lights up above the door. In fact, neon was the biggest thing at this club, because everything was neon.

Everything.

It was why the girls loved it so much. It was big, bright, and beautiful; all three things that the girls used to describe each other and their personalities. How nice it was to come to a place that represented how you saw yourself.

 

 

This place did not, however, represent much of Renee Lemaire.

Though she was big, bright, and beautiful in her own way, this place was loud and raucous, two things that she was not. Renee wanted a change of pace to get out of her comfort zone, and decided to dive right in to the brightest bar in a twenty-mile radius. Her off-the-shoulder pastel blue dress with lace flowers down the middle was the quietest thing in the club, aside from her. She had her hair braided and tied with a piece of equally pastel blue ribbon, but she thought she looked cute anyway, and didn’t need to stand out.

“You don’t need to stand out to have a good time,” she told her friend, who left half an hour earlier with some guy she just met, leaving Renee alone and without a ride. Her phone was on 5% battery, and she couldn’t do a whole lot but dance, sit at the bar and drink, and look unassuming. Maybe she shouldn’t have come out tonight?

As she was about to speak up and ask for another drink, a woman fell into her first, and then hit the bar counter.

“Sorry!” she said, briefly turning to face Renee, and then leaned over and ordered drinks for her and her two friends. In the few seconds that followed, she turned back to Renee. “Sorry for that,” she apologized. “My shoes don’t have very good traction on this floor.”

“It’s okay,” Renee replied. She looked down at her flats. “Mine don’t either.”

“Hey, you’ve got on not heels, too!” the woman exclaimed. “Flat buddies.”

Renee smiled. “I guess so.” This woman was fairly tipsy, but at least she was having a good time, being all giggly and bubbly.

“I’m Stella!” she said, sticking her hand out.

Renee went to say her name and shake Stella’s hand, but not even a moment later, two more girls joined Stella, and their drinks arrived. Shots.

“Cheers, girls!” Stella said, and they clinked their glasses together before knocking them back and going back to the dance floor.

Turning back to her drink in front of her, Renee thought, _Who says I can’t have fun without friends?_ She downed the rest of her own, wiped her mouth, and went to start dancing.

 

 

It took twenty minutes before Stella and Renee found each other on the dancefloor, pushed into each other by others and found themselves right up against each other with nowhere to go. Hands met hands and clothing. Their eyes met, but Stella couldn’t tell what color Renee’s eyes were, and she didn’t quite know why she was so concerned with finding out. Renee was feeling something but she didn’t know what.

The few times they tried to say anything to each other, their voices were drowned out by the _thump_ -ing of the music and the lyrics, if there were any. They couldn’t hear it. Everything seemed to be drowned out except for the other person.

For the rest of the song, however long that was, Stella and Renee danced closer with each other than they ever had with another person; they were practically on top of each other, but they liked it like this. Sure, they were sweating and were they not in bright neon lights alternating between dark colors and light ones, they probably would look like terrible, sweaty messes. But for right now, in this moment, that didn’t matter at all.

And then Stella was gone. She just disappeared. Renee was confused for a moment, but she soon found herself dancing with someone else, and just went with it.

Vera and Lena were pulling Stella through the crowd onto the other side of the dancefloor where the bathrooms were located, and finally stopped when they made it through, breathing heavily.

“What gives?” Stella said, trying to catch her breath. “I was–”

“I’m not feeling too good,” Vera said. “Neither is Lena.”

Lena shook her head to confirm this.

“So, you’re going home?” Stella asked.

“We are, yeah. Sorry this couldn’t–”

Stella interrupted. “I know that you two are together!” she shouted. Vera and Lena looked surprised at this outburst, and then a bit sheepish.

“How long have you known?” Lena asked, rubbing her arm.

“A few months now,” Stella replied. “But it’s okay! I’m just glad you two are happy together, and happy with your really shitty excuses to leave early.” She smiled and so did they. “Seriously, how did I not catch on sooner?”

Vera laughed. “Yeah, how did you not?”

“There were some really bad ones,” Lena said. “The worse one was ‘I left the stove on,’ by far.”

“And ‘I forgot to walk my neighbor’s dog, whom I’m housesitting for.’” Vera added.

“My favorite was ‘My snot is a different color than I think it should be, so I think I’m sick and going home.’ Most unbelievable, but it worked,” Stella said.

They parted there with Stella wishing them a good evening and to “be safe,” resulting in Vera and Lena turning red, but that could have been the neon doing that to their faces.

Stella turned back to the dancefloor, scanning the people for the woman she danced with and her braided hair and her ribbon. She didn’t realize how much of a writhing mass all these people were, and it’d be damn near impossible to find her. So, she went with her next plan: to the bar.

Upon arriving at the bar, Stella concluded that: 1) the woman was not here; 2) it was much later than she thought it was; and 3) she looked like a damn mess. Her hair was starting to fall out of the ponytail and was going everywhere. Thank you, dancing and grinding. With a sigh, Stella realized that she’d have to go through the dancefloor again to get to the bathrooms on the other side, but she powered through it with only minor injuries. She’d definitely see those bruises in the morning.

She pushed the door open and was met with more neon lighting and words scribbled on the mirror in varying shades and colors of lipstick. _Where’d you find bright blue?_ Stella thought, pausing for a moment to examine it. _Who wrote “fire, walk with me?”_

The door pushed open but Stella didn’t realize who it was. As she took her hair tie out and started to put her hair back up, she took a fleeting glance over, looked away, and did a double-take. That girl from before. She never got her name.

She didn’t seem to notice Stella as she started to fix her hair. In the end, she ended up taking her braid out and running her fingers through her hair to smooth everything out, but retained some waviness to it. Stella had to make sure she didn’t stare; she thought this woman was beautiful before, but with her hair down… _wow._

When the woman looked over briefly, Stella had to think to herself and make sure she didn’t actually say that out loud. She continued to look at herself in the mirror and leaned in, pretending like she wasn’t thinking about taking this person home with her, pretending like she wasn’t hoping the woman was looking her over, checking her out.

“I think we’ve met before,” the woman spoke up.

Stella shot straight up and looked at her. There were her eyes again. Because of the colored lights she couldn’t tell for certain. “I think we have,” she replied. “I’ve been trying to figure out if it was you that I met at the bar.”

“And I’ve been trying to figure out if you were the woman whose friends came crashing over and took tequila shots.” She smiled. “I think my hunch was right. Stella, right?”

“Yeah!” Stella nodded, smiling a little bit. “Yeah, Stella. Karamanlis.”

“Greek?” the woman asked.

Stella was a bit perplexed. “How’d you know?”

“Just a guess.” She shrugged. “The accent, how you look.”

“And you’re French?” Stella countered.

“Belgian, technically. But yes. How–”

“The accent, how you look,” Stella repeated, and the woman laughed. Stella’s heart skipped a beat.

“I feel like I’ve seen you around town before. Do you work at a restaurant?”

“The traditional Greek one run by my family, yes.”

“Is it just you?”

“Just us. I’m an only child, and my father prefers that we keep the employees as family members. My dad manages everything and cooks from time to time; my mom seats everyone sometimes but mainly cooks; and I do everything else. I wait on people, I serve the food, I clean the tables when my mom does not. It’s very busy.” Stella sighed. “But I wouldn’t want to work anywhere else.”

“It sounds like it,” the woman said. Stella really wished she had said her name by now.

“That said,” Stella added, “if within the next few days I see pita bread, or gyros, or moussaka, or anything like those, I think I might die.”

The woman laughed again. “I think I’ve passed by your family’s restaurant a few times on my way to work.”

“And where do you work?”

“The hospital. I’m a nurse.”

Stella nodded. “Now _that’s_ some hard work.”

“It is, but…” The woman smiled at Stella as she said, “I wouldn’t want to work anywhere else.”

A moment passed between them. Then another. And then another.

Stella was about to speak up and ask for her name before the door swung open and a small group of inebriated girls fell in, laughing and chattering to each other. Before she knew what was happening, the woman was gone, and Stella was left wondering her name again. And the color of her eyes. And why she was so enamored with her.

Renee wondered to herself why she was so enamored with Stella, too.

The night dragged on as Stella tried to catch sight of the woman, but to no avail. Drinks were served and empty glasses were pushed back only to be refilled again. This went on for a bit, spaced out evenly, because Stella knew what she was doing. She didn’t want to be a drunk mess when the other woman in the pastel blue and beautiful smile and heavenly laugh came around again. Stella downed one last glass before a loud, piercing noise filled the club and scattered screams came next.

She didn’t think and let instinct took over and, luckily, she had made her way towards the front of the club in preparation to leave soon, her mission fruitless. Crossing the street in hurry, she looked back when she made it across, and saw the building start to emit smoke. The next thing she saw was a woman in a pastel blue dress and long hair push back inside the club.

 

 

It was sometime later before Stella saw her again. She didn’t tend to stay until she saw her come out, not exactly, but it ended up like that. She figured that, as a nurse, it was her duty, her job, to go in and get as many people out as she could, and keep an eye on the worst cases until the ambulances arrived.

The woman was like a pastel blue flash to her; rushing around and checking in on people, stopping once to tie her hair up into a messy ponytail. She flagged the ambulances down and brought the EMTs to the ones that needed help the most. Stella had to admit that she was impressed, and that at times, her waiting tables felt an awful lot like this. She overheard that no one else was in the building, that everyone was out safely, and felt relieved. The EMTs thanked her, and then the woman started crossing the street, unknowingly over towards Stella, sitting on the curb and watching the whole thing unfold. She took the ribbon out of her hair and held it loosely in her hand.

“Nice work,” Stella said, and the woman looked up.

“Oh, no, it’s… it’s what I do every day, so I just felt like I had to do something,” she stuttered out, a pink blush starting to cover her cheeks.

“There are probably some people here that are thankful that you were here to save them,” Stella told her. “I think that deserves a compliment.”

The woman started to speak again before stopping. “I don’t think I ever gave you my name,” she said.

Stella thanked the powers that be that she realized this. “I don’t think so either.”

“Renee,” she replied. “Renee Lemaire.” She stuck her hand out.

“Well, nice to meet you for the first time, Renee Lemaire,” Stella joked, shaking her hand.

“Likewise, Stella Karamanlis,” Renee replied, and laughed. Stella laughed too.

Another moment passed between them without their saying anything, and then a cool breeze came through and took the ribbon out of Renee’s hand. She let out an “oh!” before it landed on the ground and Stella ran and grabbed it before it could go any further.

Walking back, she said, “I think this belongs to you.”

Renee did a mock curtsey. “Why thank you,” she said, then stopped. “Actually, you keep it.”

Stella paused, then blinked. “Why?”

“You can give it to me the next time we see each other,” Renee said. “If my hunch is right, then all this small talk wasn’t for nothing.”

Now it was Stella’s turn to blush. “Yeah,” she breathed. “Your hunch was right. So, when?”

“When’s your next shift at the restaurant?”

“Monday, but–”

“When’s your break?”

“About 1:20. Why–”

“Great,” Renee said, smiling. “I’ll see you then.” She gave Renee one last look over her shoulder before turning and walking deep into the parking lot, only seen in the streetlights when she passed near them.

Stella smiled and then looked down to examine the ribbon in her hand. She rubbed her thumb over it, really feeling it and taking it in. _This is definitely Renee’s color,_ she thought. _It really works on her._ For a moment, Stella looked off into the distance, thinking about something, then smiling.

 _Green,_ she thought. _Her eyes are green._


End file.
